“The Writing Exercise Challenge”

There are many different challenges and blogger awards that get passed from blog to blog. I decided to come up with a writing exercise challenge that you can do to help build up your weaknesses. Mine, personally, is writing descriptions whereas others struggle writing dialogue. See last week’s post here;

They can be as long or short as you like, as long as you get the point across to your readers.

Now tag 3 other people or ask for participants

And if you think there should be additional rules post a comment!

Want to challenge yourself further? Try writing outside of your genre. If you write romance, try your hand at horror. Or if you are a mystery writer, try writing a steamy romantic scene. Hey even mysteries have romance sometimes.

Here’s Mine. Not sure which genre it would fall under. Either sci-fi, or fantasy.

“Adina & Alon”

Dialogue Only
“Are you cold?”
“A little.”
“It will be dark soon.”
“I know but at least the rain has stopped.”
“Is it a long ways away?”
“It will take about four hours to get there.”
“Are you scared?”
“A little. It will be a big change going off to college. Oh Alon, I am going to miss you. Why can’t you come with me?”
“It is time for me to go home.”
“But whose pointy green ears will I tug when I’m scared? And whose goofy grin will greet me every morning when I awaken? You have been my best friend since I was five.”
“Adina, you know others can’t see or hear me like you do. It’s better this way and you will make new friends. Now get on the bus and don’t look back, because I will no longer be here.”
“I love you Alon. Hopefully some day we will meet again.”

Description Only
Adina looks out across the cold wet highway. She knows it will be dark soon, as she watches the sun begin to set over the horizon. Alon squeezes her hand and with misty eyes she smiles at him. Adina knows this will probably be the last time they will be together and this frightens her. She lets her eyes linger on his tousled hair, his green pointy ears and his goofy grin. He is her alien and she loves him. They have been best friends since she was five and even though no one else can see or hear him, to her he’s real.
The Greyhound bus pulls up and the door opens. Alon squeezes Adina’s hand one last time and then lets her go.
With tears in her eyes, Adina steps into the bus headed for college. She smiles at the driver and hands him her ticket. Oh, how she wishes she could hear his thoughts like Alon does. Leaving her childhood behind her, Adina watches as Alon fades into the mist.

Both Combined

Alon squeezes her hand. “Are you cold?”

Rubbing her arm, Adina smiles and looks towards the sky. “Just a little. At least the rain has stopped.”

Alon gazes out towards the setting sun. “It will be dark soon. How long will it take you to get there?”

“It will take about four hours on the bus and then the cab drive to the college will be short.”

“Are you scared?”

“Yes, going off to college will be a big change.” Adina looks into his charcoal eyes. “Oh Alon, why can’t you go with me?”

“It is time for me to go home.”

Adina reaches up and touches one of Alon’s green pointy ears. “But whose ear will I tug on when I’m scared? And who will give me a goofy grin every morning when I wake up? We have been best friends since I was five and I will miss you.”

“Adina, You know others can’t see and hear me like you do. It is better this way and you will make new friends. Now get on the bus and don’t look back, because I will no longer be here.”

Adina wraps her arms around his thin alien body. “I love you Alon. Hopefully some day we will meet again.” She steps into the bus and hands her ticket to the driver before sitting down.

Leaving her childhood behind her, Adina watches as Alon fades into the mist.

Well those are mine. Now it’s your turn and I am tagging my volunteers🙂

And I’m not sure if I was supposed to tag Dannie Hill??? http://danniehill.wordpress.com/ So Dannie it’s up to you if you take the challenge or not, either way we still love you🙂

Hey did anyone watch CSI New York last week? The first 30 minutes of the show had NO dialogue and they did an excellent job of it. You knew just by the expressions and the actions, what the people would say if they were to speak. There was all the background noises associated with the scenes, and new songs by Green Day.

And I was trying to be creative, but I’m not very good at illustrations🙂

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28 Comments

I’ll have to just ask for participants–I don’t think I know 3 other authors with blogs. Guess I should work on that! Started work on my story today. An ultra-short story, so far told two ways. Yours gives me new ideas, Karen–I was going somewhere very different with the first few lines of your dialog!

Hi Rebecca
You and my niece too. Not sure how many followers she has yet, but I don’t think very many. Start following the ones I tag and the ones who shared their book covers. They are great people! So how long till you get your short story done? Now I’m wondering where my dialogue was taking you…:-) And should it be something that should be changed? What do you think? I can’t wait until you have yours up. Email or tweet me!

I never thought of that, but you are right. I guess that would be construed as a twist or unexpected surprise. Since I normally write romance, this was a change for me and a lot of times in romance, it’s hard to come up with the unexpected.🙂

Hey, loved you little alien scene Karen. Good job. I did mine. It is posted on my blog at http://stacyfarr2.wordpress.com/
I didn’t have anyone that I knew to tag so I tagged 3 people who followed you, hope that is alright. I did my best but am still learning my way around here.
Thanks it was fun to try. Stacy

Well, it’s tempting. But I think Larry Niven (and probably several other SF writers) has already pretty much done it. My details might be different, but the idea of a couple of Spacers getting fed up with each other. . . been done.

Of course, that doesn’t mean I couldn’t go back and find out why these two hate each other so much. . .

Yeah I thought about mine too, but I’ve got so much going on right now. I’m supposed to be working on a holiday short story for a Christmas collection another author is putting together. You can check it out here http://www.shortstoriesgroup.blogspot.com/